CLARKSBURG, W.Va. (WBOY) — The Robinson Grand Performing Arts Center hosted the West Virginia Dance Company Sunday afternoon.

Officials with the art center said that the dance company’s performance is an interactive, multicultural event that brings the world to life through movement, music, magical props and costumes. The West Virginia Dance Company was founded in 1977 and has been hosting performances at public venues, schools and universities, providing entertainment through the art of dance.

“The word dance, everyone has, we actually read movement before we hear what somebody is saying, and I wish people would come out to more dance performances, and people are even afraid to book dance because music is so much more accessible, and I just wish West Virginians would come out and see more dance,” Toneta Akers-Toler, the founding member and managing artistic director of WV Dance Company, said. “The people I work with, they are amazing, hardworking artists that just have so much to offer, and most of them this year are native West Virginians, and we are very happy with our guests from other states as well.”

Recognized for both artistic achievement and excellence in arts education, the WV Dance Company has toured throughout the state, as well as 14 other states, reaching thousands of people each year.

“We always try to do something that honors our state and the people and the communities that hold this place together no matter what traumas, that are political things, we go through there are still these little communities that just show love to their families and anybody that comes together. So, I chose to come back here to do my art form in 1977 and I am just really happy that West Virginia has accepted us,” Akers-Toler said. “We are just thrilled to be here and just so proud of Jason Young and what he is doing in the state as well with Shakespeare, and his wife Sara, and it is just wonderful to be at this amazing theatre, that is a theatre to be so proud of all across our country. So, we have lots of wonderful treasures in West Virginia.”

The WV Dance Company performance at the Robinson Grand is supported in part through a grant from the West Virginia Division of Arts, Culture and History.